TELEVISION

LOUIE

LOUIE 5×03: "COP STORY"

With its trademark precision, sympathy, and discomfort, Louie takes a sideways look at police brutality.

LOUIE

LOUIE 5×02: "A LA CARTE"

Moving from poop jokes to relationship wisdom to exploring the essence of comedy itself, Louie refuses to be locked into any one model.

GAME OF THRONES

GAME OF THRONES 5×01: "THE WARS TO COME"

The good lords are dead, and the rest are monsters. But in the new world order, individuals have the freedom to choose what kind of world they want to live in.

LOUIE

LOUIE 5×01: "POT LUCK"

As I begin my coverage of the fifth season of Louie, we learn—not for the first time—that life is a shitty pot luck.

MAD MEN

MAD MEN 7×08: "SEVERANCE"

At the beginning of the end of Mad Men, the characters—and we—are already asking: is that all there is?

BINGE WATCH

BREAKING BAD Binge Watch – 5×01–5×08

As we enter this final season of Breaking Bad, it's no longer even a question whether Walter White is redeemable: it's just a question of how he will ultimately be punished, and how many lives he will destroy before he is.

TV LISTS AND ROUNDUPS

WHAT I'M WATCHING — January 18–24, 2015

This week the Unaffiliated Critic kept it 100 with The Nightly Show, speed-watched The Flash, tried on The Hollow Crown, gleefully suffered Slings & Arrows, and endured about as much of Backstrom as he could stand.

TV LISTS AND ROUNDUPS

WHAT I'M WATCHING — January 11–17, 2015

This week I catch up with Jane the Virgin, check out the pilots of Togetherness and Man Seeking Woman, and recommend some British shows you've never heard of.

TV LISTS AND ROUNDUPS

WHAT I'M WATCHING — January 4–10, 2015

A quick round-up of what The Unaffiliated Critic has been watching this week, including Agent Carter, Empire, The Americans, and more…

TELEVISION

THE AFFAIR 1×08

Episode Eight of The Affair grapples with a key question: it it better to stick it out, or let it go?

TELEVISION

THE AFFAIR 1×05

On The Affair, questions of "right" and "wrong" are as complicated—and as subjective—as questions of "true" and "false."

TELEVISION

THE AFFAIR 1×04

As Noah and Alison move from fantasy to reality, The Affair proves that its alternating point-of-view structure is much more than a "gimmick."

TELEVISION

THE AFFAIR 1×03

One way we can look at The Affair is as a metaphor for the writing process, in which various drafts and revisions of the story are presented side-by-side…

TELEVISION

THE AFFAIR 1×02

The Affair is using a common—even banal—situation to explore smart and subtle questions about identity and subjectivity reality.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 8×09: "FLATLINE"

I can be as grumpy as the next critic, but seriously: anyone who can't love a Doctor Who episode like "Flatline" should get out of the Doctor Who-loving business.

FIRST LOOK/LAST LOOK

THE AFFAIR 1×01

The Affair, the new drama from Showtime, is the best new series of the year, and a daring attempt to expand the narrative possibilities of television.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 8×07: "KILL THE MOON"

Tough decisions, difficult confrontations, and painful emotional growth: sometimes, Doctor Who isn't meant to be easy.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 8×06: "THE CARETAKER"

"The Caretaker" is a relatively light episode of Doctor Who, but that doesn't mean there aren't important things happening: some of them kind of troubling.

BINGE WATCH

BREAKING BAD Binge Watch – 3×11–3×13

As Season Three comes to an end, I embrace the spirit of "binge-watching" by attempting (with mixed success) to live-blog the last three episodes.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 8×05: "TIME HEIST"

"Time Heist" isn't bad, it just isn't much of anything: it's all surface, no substance, delivering nothing more or less than what was promised in the title.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 8×04: "LISTEN"

Steven Moffat's stunning, exquisite "Listen" is an episode about nothing, and recognizing that nothing can be a very scary thing.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 8×03: "ROBOT OF SHERWOOD"

"That would be a rubbish idea," the Doctor says, and he might as well be talking about the entirety of Mark Gatiss's "Robot of Sherwood."

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 8×02: "INTO THE DALEK"

With an older star, a darker tone, and a slower pace, this is not your father's Doctor Who. (Or, more to the point, it is…)

BINGE WATCH

BREAKING BAD Binge Watch – 3×01–3×05

The problem with with Walter White being torn between good and bad is that we want him to be bad. We need him to be bad. We crave the thrill of badness every bit as much as he does.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 8×01: "DEEP BREATH"

Everything old is new again in Doctor Who, but the show seems overly worried about whether we'll go along with the changes.

FIRST LOOK/LAST LOOK

THE KNICK 1×01 – "Method and Madness"

Steven Soderbergh spent most of his movie career making formulaic B-movies better than they had any right to be. Now he does the same thing for TV in a pretty but (so far) predictable new series from Cinemax.

FIRST LOOK/LAST LOOK

OUTLANDER 1×01 – "Sessanach"

Outlander may look like an old-fashioned bodice-ripper, but—based on this confident, compelling first episode—it may turn out to be groundbreaking television.

BINGE WATCH

BREAKING BAD Binge Watch – Episodes 1×05–1×07

There's a big mystery at the center of Breaking Bad so far: just who exactly is Walter White? What happened to him, and what is he capable of, and does he have any moral center at all?

Game of Thrones 4x10 - The Children
GAME OF THRONES

GAME OF THRONES 4×10: "THE CHILDREN"

In the beginning, GAME OF THRONES seemed like a show about keeping the children safe. Now it's becoming a show about keeping safe from the children.

GAME OF THRONES

GAME OF THRONES 4×07: "MOCKINGBIRD"

We all have a vision of the world the way it should be. It's a place where we all grow up in happy families (who care for us as they should), and we all go on adventures (which work out just the way they're supposed to), and we all fall in love and live happily after (with the person who will love us back forever). It sounds like a nice place, that world.

GAME OF THRONES

GAME OF THRONES 4×05: "FIRST OF HIS NAME"

"First of His Name" explores a theme that has been present all season: the way women are forced to navigate this world differently than men do, and to find ways to use their power differently.

GAME OF THRONES

GAME OF THRONES 4×04: "OATHKEEPER"

In a world in which every person is defined by their house, family, nation, class, gender, and allegiances, deciding to change can be a bit of a challenge.

MISCELLANEOUS

TRUE DETECTIVE GREETING CARDS

A series of greeting card ideas, based on the gentle, life-affirming wisdom of HBO's TRUE DETECTIVE.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 50TH ANNIVERSARY SPECIAL: "THE DAY OF THE DOCTOR"

"The Day of the Doctor" is full of fan-service and tributes to both the old and new series, but at its core it is simply the next vital chapter in Doctor Who, one that fulfills what I have called "The Moffat Masterplan" and brings the past, present, and future of this show into glorious agreement.

MARVEL'S AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.

MARVEL'S AGENTS OF SHIELD 1×03: "THE ASSET"

"There will come a moment when you have to commit to this or bail," a character says in "The Asset." To be honest, I haven't completely decided yet, so I'm going to keep it short this week.

MARVEL'S AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.

MARVEL'S AGENTS OF SHIELD 1×02: "0-8-4"

"0-8-4," the second episode of Agents of SHIELD, is not a quantum leap forward for the series—I doubt anyone is proclaiming this a classic to rival the best of Joss Whedon's work yet—but I'm starting to see some encouraging signs. This week's episode actually seemed like it was inching towards being a show I could invest in.

MARVEL'S AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.

MARVEL'S AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D 1×01: "PILOT"

AGENTS OF SHIELD has got some wit, and it's got some moves, but it's only my trust in Joss Whedon that will make me stick around long enough to see if it has a soul.

GAME OF THRONES

GAME OF THRONES 3×10: "MHYSA"

"Mhysa" asks us to reconsider the concept of family, which has been so central to GAME OF THRONES.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 7×13: "THE NAME OF THE DOCTOR"

"The Name of the Doctor" is not perfect, and it does not make up for an uneven and scattered season, but it's a return to form for Steven Moffat, and a welcome revisiting of the underlying themes that made his first two seasons so powerful and so resonant.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 7×11: "THE CRIMSON HORROR"

Every fan of DOCTOR WHO has his or her own opinion on the "worst episode ever." But ask me today and my answer might just be different from the one I'd have given you yesterday.

GAME OF THRONES

GAME OF THRONES 3×05: "KISSED BY FIRE"

The peaks and valleys are a large part of the appeal of GAME OF THRONES, and the highs would not seem so high, or the lows so low, if the emotional beats weren't completely earned.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 7×10: "JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE TARDIS"

Somewhere within the wreckage of "Journey to the Center of the TARDIS" there was a great episode of DOCTOR WHO to be found, but—like the Doctor—what we find instead is a big old mess in desperate need of a do-over.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 7×09: "HIDE"

"Hide" is not just the best entry in Series 7 so far; it's also a perfect example of how classic Who can be updated for modern times.

GAME OF THRONES

GAME OF THRONES 3×03: "WALK OF PUNISHMENT"

I take a little break from analysis, and approach "Walk of Punishment" as an excuse for some general appreciation and a long overdue geek-out. Because DAMN this show is good.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 7×08: "COLD WAR"

If I find myself just reviewing an episode, it usually means something has gone terribly, terribly wrong. So here's my review of "Cold War."

MAD MEN

MAD MEN 6×01-02: "THE DOORWAY"

The man born as Dick Whitman had to die once to escape who he was, and now—as the world has changed unrecognizably around him—the carefully constructed persona he created just feels like another stagnant, stifling identity he longs to shed and leave behind.

DOCTOR WHO

DOCTOR WHO 2012 SPECIAL: "THE SNOWMEN"

The 2012 Christmas special gives us memory-erasing worm, a spiral staircase to the clouds, and—of course—the titual killer snowmen from outer space. But "The Snowmen" is a little more complicated than that, and thematically far richer.

AMERICAN HORROR STORY

AMERICAN HORROR STORY 2X02: "TRICKS AND TREATS"

I enjoy the crazy-ass, batshit, random elements of American Horror Story, but I wish they were used with a little more purpose and planning. Even if the entire mission statement is to be scary, the show forgets that fear is a product of anticipation and dread: if you just fling things at our screens willy-nilly, none of them are going to register as they should.